Bone Meal For Roses

by Miranda Sherry

  ‘We had “the talk”.’ Le Roux bites and chews, and while he does, everyone waits. Delia swirls her fingers in the orange goo, Liezette looks down at her unexciting plate, and Antoinette, who seems unable to relinquish her serving spoon, doles out another dollop of stuff onto her own.

  ‘And?’ Antoinette asks at last.

  ‘And our dear daughter seems to think that our idea of having her and Charlie take over the running of the farm when we retire is ridiculous.’

  ‘Liezie?’ Antoinette pleads.

  ‘Well it is. Come on, Daddy, how many times do I have to tell you that Charlie’s got a career. He’s not just waiting around for me to inherit the farm. He’s making huge waves in the design and interior decorating industry already.’

  ‘His work is very lovely,’ Antoinette says to no one in particular.

  ‘You’ve got it all planned out, don’t you, Liezette?’ le Roux growls at his daughter. ‘Your precious Charlie is going to be rich and famous, he’s going to take you places, isn’t that it?’

  ‘Who says it won’t happen? What the hell do you know about life outside this backwater valley, Dad? There’s stuff happening out there. Art. Fashion, design. These things might not be “from the land” but they matter, and Charlie is a part of that. You’re just too out of touch to see it.’

  ‘And you? How do you fit into all of this, Liezette? Who says there’ll still be a place for you when the man is big and famous and he can have his pick of any bit of skirt he wants?’

  ‘Thanks, Dad. That’s lovely.’

  ‘No, listen to me, my girl. It’s not all about Charlie this and Charlie that… what about you? I want to leave the farm to YOU.’

  Liezette looks at her father with tear-varnished eyes.

  ‘But I don’t want it, Daddy. I want the future that he’s going to give me.’

  ‘Well then.’ Le Roux takes a sip of his wine. The base of the glass shudders against the tabletop when he places it back down again. ‘I hope you’re not too disappointed.’

  ‘With what?’

  ‘When the people who think he’s such hot stuff today suddenly swing their favour to the next guy and forget all about Charlie. Fashion is fickle, that much I do know about it. You need something solid. Earth and fruit have been here for centuries, the co-op will always need grapes. This place could give you a real future.’

  ‘I already have a future.’ Liezette’s voice wobbles. ‘If all you can trot out is a tired old cliché, then…’ She cuts a piece of meat, lifts it to her mouth, puts her fork back down again.

  ‘Then what?’ Delia asks. They all turn to look at the child, who took the opportunity, while everyone was arguing, to cover her face and hair in a thick coating of mashed sweet potato.

  ‘Good Lord, look at you.’ Liezette bursts into tears, jumps up from the table and collects her sticky child in her arms. ‘We need to get you cleaned up.’

  ‘Mama, why are you crying?’ Delia asks as she’s whisked from the room.

  The dining room is quiet. Le Roux takes another sip of his wine. Long minutes pass.

  ‘But what about our plans to move to Hermanus one day?’ Antoinette asks at last.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  SAM WAKES WHEN the sun is already high and the heat has burrowed its way into all the hidden corners and hollows of the valley. She lies on her back, sweat-damp covers thrown off, and stares at the large, soft-bodied rain spider that’s squatting in the corner by the ceiling.

  For the first time in years, Sam doesn’t bother to apologise to the rain spider for the ‘spider-jar’ incident from when she was little. She just rolls over in bed and luxuriates in the memory of yesterday, and how she felt, sitting there and having lunch with Charlie in Cape Town: just like a normal woman, out with her boyfriend.

  Boyfriend. Can I use that word yet? How do you know when it’s time? She runs through what she can remember of Jem’s love letters to Anneke, hunting for clues, but there’s nothing helpful there. She thinks of the message Charlie spelled out in wood for her, months ago. When is he going to write another one to tell her that he’s in love with her? He must be, or else he wouldn’t have held her hand over the table, in public. Isn’t that how it’s supposed to go?

  Sam and Charlie had spent the long drive back to the valley in companionable, air-conditioned silence. It was late when they finally got to the barn, and in the dark beside the plum trees, Charlie had ruffled her hair and given her a quick pat on the bottom to send her on her way. There was no chance for her to voice the question she’d been planning to ask him: Can I stay with you?

  So here she is, again. On the wrong side of the hill. Alone.

  Except for the spider.

  Sam gets up and pulls off her nightshirt, dropping it on the floor on the way to the bathroom. What would she sleep in if she were sharing a bed with Charlie? Not that old thing, surely? It was once a vest belonging to Jem, and has coffee stains on the hem.

  I guess, she thinks as she turns the taps to start her bath, I could just wear nothing. She places her hands on the warm flat of her belly and then runs them up her ribs and then down again.

  *

  With the exams now past and passed, and no more school assignments till next year, Sam has nothing to prepare for but the walk up and over the hill. Today, she’s packed a small backpack. It’s the one she usually uses for carrying supplies from the shop along with her schoolbooks and pencils, but there’s none of that inside it now. Sam has packed a few clothes and some toiletries, and her precious old hunting knife that once belonged to Anneke’s father. She slides the bag’s straps over her shoulders and descends the steps from the stoop to the garden, buoyed up by the presence of her toothbrush nestling in amongst a few bunched-up clothes inside it. The press of the canvas against her back makes her think of the shell of a tortoise. She’s protected by that little toothbrush and what it signifies. Strong. She marches past the rose bed without even needing to speed into a run.

  The roses are already sending out new buds, despite their recent massacre. I should water them. It’s an automatic thought, a throwback to the ‘old Sam’. With a slap of wet braid against the bag, she tosses her head to dismiss it, and walks on.

  *

  ‘Hello?’

  Charlie looks up to see the water-eyed girl stride into the workshop, smiling and radiant. He smiles back, although he’s not entirely comfortable with her announcing herself. She used to just slide in like a shadow. Also, she’s brought a bag with her today. What’s that about? He watches as she places it on the floor and then sits down beside it.

  All morning he’s been at a loss without the Water-Wood Collection, which, at this very moment, is being artfully arranged inside the blank white space of the gallery by a bunch of trendies. But now, as soon as the girl’s strange full-moon eyes come to rest on him, he can feel the edges of his new piece rising up inside him, pushing on the insides of his veins and stretching his skin.

  It’s going to be a chair. There’s something both spare and complex about a chair, something satisfying. He crouches down beside a pile of raw timber, touches one plank, and then another. He can feel Sam’s gaze on the side of his face, making his skin feel hot and cool at the same time. How does she do it? The question is forgotten almost as soon as it comes, because suddenly, Charlie knows this new chair. It’s going to be hard-edged and linear with sharp corners and geometric dovetail joints so tight that the whole piece will look ironed. It will need an upholstered seat, and will be hewn from something dense and dark. Kiaat? His fingertips dance over the grain of a wide piece of timber the colour of black tea that’s been brewed too long. Teak.

  *

  Liezette unhooks Rolo’s bridle from its spot in the tackroom and, ignoring the offers of assistance from the hovering stable hand, strides out into the paddock. The leather straps swing from her hand, and the metal parts jingle with false cheer. It’s late for a ride, already too hot, but Liezette is determined to have one anyway.

 
‘Rolo,’ she calls, ‘here boy!’ The brown horse looks up from the snack he’s enjoying alongside the other horses in the cool shade beneath the karee tree, but doesn’t move. Liezette shades her eyes against the glare, almost slapping herself in the face with the bridle. She calls as sweetly as her black mood will allow: ‘Come on, big boy, let’s go for a ride. Won’t that be nice?’

  In response, Rolo shakes a fly from his nose and lowers his vast head to snick off another bit of grass. Liezette can already feel rivulets of sweat streaming down her back beneath her shirt. A ride out now would be lunacy. It would be hell. She squares her shoulders and sets off across the bright field towards the horses.

  ‘ROLO!’ she demands when the animal shies away from her attempts to slip the bridle over his head. ‘For heaven’s sake.’ The horse steps away and stares at her. His always-huge eyes seem even larger and his ears flick back in alarm. She tries again, and although Rolo is happy to have her stroke between his ears and run her hand down his bony muzzle, as soon as the bridle comes near, he shakes her off.

  The sun pounds down onto Liezette’s skull. It feels as if her brain is melting from the combined onslaught of the heat and the unreasonable rage that’s been boiling up inside her since her father proposed his ‘retirement plan’ to her yesterday. She was hoping to talk to Charlie about it when he got home from Cape Town last night, but he was monosyllabic with tiredness and had pushed her aside with a ‘not now, Liez’. This morning, he’d been up and out of the house by the time she’d gotten Delia up, and Liezette’s been churning ever since. A ride, even a hellish ride through the noon furnace, is what she needs. It’s what she wants. Liezette always gets what she wants.

  Apparently, Rolo is unaware of this.

  ‘Come on, you goddam horse,’ she yells when he trots beyond her reach for a fifth time. He swishes his tail in response. The other horses have backed away from her, too, ears back, unnerved by the shouting. Liezette can feel the frustration burning at the back of her throat, threatening tears. She glares at Rolo, who puts his head down and nibbles at another bit of turf. My father just bought me this stupid horse to control me, didn’t he? Liezette thinks. To buy me off so I’d do what he wants me to. As if I’m still a child. She clutches the leather very tight, and then opens her fingers to let the bridle fall onto the dry grass. Screw that. I’m tired of it always being about what everyone else wants. She turns and walks back to the stable, boiling beneath her skin. What about me?

  ‘Aren’t you riding today, missus?’

  ‘I don’t know, genius,’ she barks at the startled stable hand. ‘What does it bloody look like?’ The young man gulps and shrugs, unsure of what’s expected of him. ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, just get out there and fetch the bloody tack, please.’

  ‘Yes, missus.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  FROM HIGH UP on the front bench of the delivery truck that she flagged down earlier, Yolande approaches her hometown as if she’s in a glass tunnel that’s been fogged up around the edges. The only clear spot in her vision is a disc of grey road directly in front of the vehicle. All the rest: the fynbos, the dry earth, the vineyards, the fruit trees in full leaf and the far blue mountains, are a blurry, indistinct madness on the periphery.

  ‘I don’t know why they bothered to tar this road,’ she says. ‘I mean, as if anyone would want to get to this dump any faster!’ Yolande opens the window a slice so that she can ash her cigarette out into the valley.

  The driver who picked her up and then, in a half-hearted fashion, felt her up, glances across at Yolande as if she’s just sprouted horns.

  ‘You’re getting out here, right?’ He speaks in that particular, local sing-song Afrikaans that makes Yolande think of the time when she was too young to leave. It’s the sound of the workers amongst the fruit trees. She can practically smell salty sweat mixed in with the bitterness of leaf-sap in the sun. ‘Because I have to drop you off at the next turn-off,’ the driver continues. ‘I’m not supposed to pick up hitchers, and—’

  ‘Yes, yes, no need to panic. I’ll be out of your hair in a minute.’

  Silence. Yolande blinks at the tatty vinyl of the truck’s dash. She’s got it figured out. Who the girl with the hair is. Fuckers. A chemical belch leaps out from her guts and into her mouth. Think they can pull this one over on me? They’ve got another think coming.

  Yolande remembers the way Jem had looked down at the child that day of the funeral, the care so evident in the tilt of his head. Even from Yolande’s hiding place, through a fog of chemicals, she could see it. Like she was his daughter. Yolande snorts now at the memory. But one that he wanted.

  Well she’s not getting what’s mine. Yolande almost speaks the words out loud. She’s got to be stopped.

  Oh yes, Yolande is on the road and ready. Rat-ready. Rat-a-tat-tat.

  But now that the driver is steering the truck towards the shoulder of the highway by the turn-off, and motioning for her to climb out, the blood in her veins feels thick and sludgy, like fruit juice that’s been left to evaporate and is getting all sticky. She clutches her bag. She’s got her rig in there, and a few nice fresh packets of stuff that she’s been itching to cook up ever since she scored this morning. That would thin her out a bit, give her some breathing space. But not yet. She’s been good about saving it. She’s being patient. She’s had to be. Out here in this backwater shithole, she’s going to need all the help she can get.

  *

  Sam waits for Charlie to pause and take a break. She waits for him to let go of the rough timber and hold her body in his hands instead. She watches from the floor in the shade of the wall, and wonders where her dimpled stool is, and who is sitting on it now. She takes a drink of water from the same plastic bottle that they shared that once, the first time he kissed her. She’s kept it ever since, despite the fact that the cheap plastic is dented and foggy with use. She presses her tongue into the bottle rim. She watches, waits, but Charlie works without a pause. To Sam, he doesn’t even seem to be breathing.

  *

  Mr Vosloo leans across the shop counter, bumping an unthinking elbow into Betty’s arm, and gawps at the creature with her yellow skin and scabby lips.

  ‘Yolande?’ His grin fails to shift the scarecrow stranger’s scowl. ‘Jem and Anneke’s Yolande?’

  ‘Yes,’ Yolande says again, exasperated. ‘I remember you, Kobus.’ They were in the same school, but Kobus Vosloo was years ahead of Yolande. She’s not surprised to see that he’s running the Super Saver now. Just like his father did when they were kids. Jesus, imagine she’d never left this place either? Who would she be now? The thought brings a splutter of cracked, bitter laughter.

  Kobus Vosloo joins in because something must be funny. This woman-snake creature has to be a joke of some sort. She can’t be Yolande, that’s for damn sure. Yolande was a pretty, curvy thing with dimples and a shiny ponytail. She used to give handjobs to the boys behind the church sometimes. Did she ever give one to him? He wishes he could remember.

  ‘So anyway. I’m on my way to see them. Was wondering if someone could give me a lift to the farmhouse.’

  ‘To visit Jem, you mean. Anneke’s passed.’

  ‘I know that. I’m not stupid.’

  ‘Well, he’s not at the farmhouse any more.’ Vosloo is still trying to remember his high-school handjobs, and this scary stick of straw is not helping. She’s got a weird look in her bloodshot eyes that he’s not keen on at all. ‘Sussie and François live there ever since Jem and Annie sold off the farm.’

  ‘They sold the farm?’ Yolande’s lips go white. That’s her inheritance they’ve chucked away, thank you very much, and without that, this whole trip is pointless.

  ‘Well not all of it. They kept a little corner. They went to live in the old stables. Made the place beautiful, Jem did. Put all his heart and soul into it when Annie got sick.’ Vosloo rubs the side of his meaty jaw with a hairy-knuckled paw. ‘Mind you, he’s not doing too well himself, these days. Haven’t seen
him around town in months. He’s lucky that kid is there to…’

  But Yolande is already walking out the door and into the stark noonday sun.

  ‘Goodbye to you too, scarecrow,’ Vosloo mutters. He turns to see Betty staring at him with her unfathomable black eyes. ‘Hey, don’t look at me like that, klonkie.’ He’s in a bad mood now because he’s just remembered that he never got a handjob behind the church. Ever. Little slut was too full of herself. She wanted you to grovel for it, to beg. ‘Remember, Betty, my girl, you’re replaceable, hey? Any cheek from you and I’ll give your job to someone else. There’s plenty waiting in line, believe me.’ He manoeuvres his beer gut out from behind the counter and makes his way to the far end of the store to where his saggy old sofa waits on the porch out the back.

  Now that he thinks about it, he did beg.

  How did decent folk like Jem and Anneke ever spawn a little tart like that?

  *

  ‘No.’ Charlie’s eyes are wide and shocked. His mouth has gone from kissing-soft into a thin, stiff line. He picks up her blouse from the floor where she dropped it earlier, and offers it to her as if to say ‘cover yourself’. Sam takes the bunched-up fabric, but she doesn’t get dressed. She stays on the floor with sawdust sticking to her skin and watches him pull on his clothes. He does it fast, as if he’s running late for something. ‘That’s not possible, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But I thought…’ Sam thinks of the love letters that Jem wrote, all that devotion, that attention. Isn’t that what it’s supposed to be like? Not like this. Not this captured, frightened look in Charlie’s eyes. The Cape Town trip, their lunch together, her talking and him answering just as if they’re a regular couple, she thought all of that meant the next step. Sam glances over at her bag in the corner with her toothbrush in it. But did she really? How much of this plan was just about her wanting to get away from the roses? Goosebumps break out all over Sam’s naked skin.

  ‘I can’t go back.’